Quoth the Sparrow
by lembaslover
Summary: [CotBP] A series of five sketches hastily scribbled on a borrowed memo pad during a holiday in Florida.


**And the raven, never flitting, still is sitting, still is sitting  
On the pallid bust of Pallas just above my chamber door;  
And his eyes have all the seeming of a demon's that is dreaming.  
And the lamplight o'er him streaming throws his shadow on the floor;  
And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor  
Shall be lifted---nevermore!**

* * *

**I. Once Upon a Midnight**  
She's got a real majesty about her, the _Black Pearl_ does. Not the loud Navy blue-velvet-and-brocade brand of majesty, nor the brutal desert island salt-sand-and-rum brand of majesty, but a real majesty, a midnight horizon majesty, all soft and subtle shades of beauty.

Capt. Hector Barbossa (_Captain_. He smiles.) is not a man easily impressed anymore. But one idle night he stands at the helm and admits that Jack was right. He closes his eyes, sweeps a hand across the lovingly polished woodwork, and adds his breath to the dark maid's gentle sighs.

Jack was right - she's got a real majesty about her.

**II. Still Beguiling All My Sad Soul Into Smiling**  
Elizabeth rarely dares to venture outside her lonely cabin nowadays, and she knows full well that under any other circumstances - on _any_ other ship - that would be an exact reverse. The irony of it tastes bitter in her mouth. (Honestly, there's enough irony hovering ghost-like among the sails as it is.)

But today is different. Today is calm and relaxed, with very few demons on deck at all, and the sight of the sea is enough to tempt her as far as the main mast. The wind that floats butterfly-like through the rigging reminds her of just why she loves the sea. (And she can't help but smirk as she sees, out of the corner of her eye, the demon-captain trail his hand absently through the breeze, as though trying to catch it and lock it up somewhere safe.)

_The moonlight shows us for what we really are._

But even better than a soft, gentle day, tonight will be one bearing a new moon.

**III. This and More I Sat Divining**  
A particularly nasty storm is making its way across the ocean, and Bootstrap Bill knows it immediately. He can tell by the way the fish that once nibbled happily on his fingers instead have retreated to their secret hideaways. He can tell by the way the ocean that once was a vibrant Caribbean black is now a moody English black. He can tell by the way the rotting fabric of his sleeve that once floated dreamily instead dances a far more erratic and uneven pattern. (He can't actually feel the current but if he tries hard enough he can imagine it, only that makes not feeling somehow even worse.) In any case, he knows the storm is coming.

What he doesn't know is that hundreds of feet directly above his head, his son William will be weathering that same storm under the care of a newfound friend and guardian angel - a governor's daughter, young Elizabeth Swann.

**IV. The Rare and Radiant Maiden**  
Will Turner had always known the ocean was large. That's just common sense. He is not new to sailing, either; there was the passage from England eight years ago, as well as the inevitability of living in one of the biggest ports on the Atlantic. Everyone knows it.

But now he _really_ knows it. He could spin around in circles (as he had occasionally seen the pirate, Sparrow, do in those not uncommon circumstances in which he was the worse for drink), and all he would ever see is that stucco-surface flat plane of all one despairing shade of faded velvet.

This itself is not so disheartening, but then he remembers (though he could never truly forget) that he is sailing to a largely unknown destination with a largely unknown pirate, chasing after some other largely unknown pirates who could be absolutely anywhere on the ocean, to rescue Miss Elizabeth Swann from a painfully known fate. And the ocean is looking painfully, impossibly large.

**V.** **Leave No Black Plume as a Token**  
It is with a light head and a heavy heart that a slightly inebriated Jack Sparrow flops down on the sand and looks to the pulled-cotton clouds that periodically interrupt the violent Caribbean sunset.

That one looks like a fish, he says, and the loneliness echoes around him.

That one looks like a bird, a sparrow, free to fly free as it likes.

That one looks like a conch shell, like the ones that hide in the sand and bite at his feet.

That one looks like a ship, but not _his_ ship, not storm-dark and lovely.

That one looks like a pistol. It carries but one shot.

That one looks like a man. Barbossa. Beaten, broken, and bleeding. Lying half-buried in thrice-cursed gold and bleeding all over it. He'd shred that bloody pompous hat, too. The one with the feather. Right in front of his bloody face as the life slips from his cold demon eyes.

He scowls; the clouds are conspiring to prolong his smouldering misery. Clearly, more rum is needed to remedy this.


End file.
